How To Integrate 3D Technology With Your Website

Why Use 3D Elements On Your Website?

If you want to wow your audience and instantly interest them in your website, then there is no better option than including 3D models and environments within your website. Since 3D is not overly common – seeing it on websites is somewhat of a rare occasion – you will have the advantage of shock and amazement on your side, since your viewers will be mesmerized by the new-looking technology and instantly invested. It is a brilliant way to showcase your company’s forward-thinking and technologically-sound ideals and content.

The 3D technology may not be all new and fresh but people are still not expecting to see it on websites and it can be a shock factor and a delightful surprise to them. This can actually help you gain more visitors and keep them coming back. This gives you an opportunity to convert them with the high quality of your content.

Examples Of 3D Being Used In Websites

Campoallecomete.it is an excellent example of how 3D can be used to create a beautiful interface which users can interact with, since this website, which, surprisingly, has only been created to advertise wine, lets the user travel through a 3D model of a ‘world’ or ‘city’, which looks like it has been taken out of a high-budget fantasy movie aimed at a younger audience, and clicking on certain parts of the model gives the user more information about the wine. It is a brilliant website which showcases the power of 3D animation and modelling, and how it can be used for a great impact within advertising.

3D technology can also help you transform your storytelling, as this example can show you.

Here’s an example of a regular wine-related website:

Now, it looks amazing and it can really impress a user right from the get go. The website is called TranscendentWines and it’s really elegant and informative but in a fun way. When you move down from the initial video, you will find a story supported by pictures, various wine options and so on.

Of course, there are more regular websites with a more classic design, but this is one of the better examples of how design can be used to support a brand and show a brand personality. However, it doesn’t have that 3D design which is a nice thing to have on your website.

See, people might get bored on this website after a while. But take a look at this:

This is a 3D website for a wine company which was mentioned earlier. It has an amazing introduction where they give you a quick intro into what you are about to see, the imagery is beautiful, you will actually feel like you are flying across the sky. Every time you enter this website, it will make you smile simply because it’s something new, fun and unexpected. It tells a story in a completely new way.

See those green dots? These are the story points. Whenever you click on a green dot, it will show you a part of the story and tell you something new. If you don’t want to learn more, you can just hang around, circling around the castle and all of its elements, enjoying the imagery.

It’s really fun, almost like a game or a movie and you get to be a part of it.

This is, in fact, one of the best points of 3D – it makes the user a part of the story. They have to click and move around and be the narrators as well. They define what the website will tell them and what they will learn.

It’s a zen-like, relaxing experience which can help your users truly enjoy what you have to give them.

Think about incorporating these elements both for the storytelling powers and the possibility to include your readers in the process.

How To Add 3D To Your Website

“For many people considering adding 3D to their websites, they may try to hire professionals in 3D coding and modelling, but there are some simpler and less time-wasting solutions,” Elliot Barker, a project manager at Writemyx.com and Britstudent.com, suggests, “such as a simple Google search for companies which specialise in 3D animation and assets. They may have a library of sample resources for you to browse through, and a support team for any queries that you may have, so a specialised company is certainly a better option, in many ways, than hiring one poor 3D animator, who will have to work on their own and field all your and your tech team’s questions on 3D.”

You will need a series of professionals, actually. For one, you will need a 3D animator, obviously, someone to draw and animate the beautiful imagery you want to incorporate. Sometimes, one person will be able to both draw and animate but it also may be that you will need two professionals for this – one to draw and one to animate different aspects. If your idea is slightly more demanding, you may need a bigger team for all of this.

You will also need a frontend developer and a backend developer, web designer and so on. There are a bunch of people that you will need in this process, but getting a good agency for this to do the job for you or possibly a specialized person who creates 3D websites and that’s their only focus.

In this case, make sure that you review the portfolio of the person doing the job or the portfolio of the agency doing the job as you want to make sure that you like their style and the way they do things.

Creating 3D Objects Or Scenes

If you decide to create your own 3D assets, then you should be able to find a variety of programs online which you can download and use. They might not all be free – in fact, good quality programs may be quite costly – so you’ll have to weigh up the pros and cons of using this software, but, if you do find an excellent program to use, they usually have extensive tutorials on how to use the software and how to create assets, so you will be well looked after if you decide to go down this route and be independent.

Generating A 3D Web Embed Code

“One option which you can utilize to get your 3D assets out of the program you made them in and closer to being usable is making a ‘web embed’ code,” Ryan Evatt, a web developer at Nextcoursework.com and Australia2write.com, says, “which will allow you to start embedding 3D objects and environments into your website. Using a website like Modelo.io will let you create an embed code easily, since that is the entire purpose of their company, and you can customise a lot of final elements of your 3D model like size, whether to have comments and if the 3D animation begins immediately. It gives you a lot of freedom!”

Of course, if you give your website to a team of professionals, you can count on the fact that they will embed your website in the best way possible and make it so that the animation doesn’t load too slowly and that everything works perfectly for you and your consumers.

Inserting A Web Embed Code

Once you have obtained your web embed code, it is a very simple and easy process to get your 3D model or scene into your website – you simply have to edit the code of the website. Depending on whether your website has been created by yourself or by a tech team, this could involve delegation, but, if it doesn’t and you have used one of the many, popular commercial website makers, then this may be as easy as finding the option for editing the HTML of the website and copy-and-pasting in the code for your 3D element in the correct position.

Utilizing A 3D Viewer

If you have used a different 3D animation company, such as Vectary.com, then you may have the option to edit your 3D models and scenes within your website, through a 3D viewer. This can be excellent for people who benefit from visual aids for the creation of assets, rather than trudging through mountains of code with no physical assets to be seen. Vectary, for example, allows you to make changes to code then instantly see those changes to the 3D elements when the code is regenerated, which can be preferable for a lot of developers. This can be very useful if you want to knw if you have made a mistake anywhere right when you make it so that you don’t have ti take ten steps back to find it. Make sure that you utilizing this, especially if you have created most of your animation parts and segments. It can be really fun for you to play around and create different things.